Module Catalogue 2026/27

Pre Requisite Comment

N/A

Co Requisite Comment

N/A

Aims

- To provide an introduction to some of the core conceptual tools of critical, radical and cultural musicology
- To provide a solid foundation in the cultural theory of music for students intending to go on to produce a dissertation in their final year.
- To investigate systematically a range of hermeneutic, text critical and theoretical approaches to music from recent music scholarship and elsewhere.

This module is intended to help you gain knowledge of a range of cultural-theoretical paradigms. These may vary from year to year, but would typically include: structuralist and poststructuralist theories, theories of colonisation, postcolonial theory, other approaches to theorising identity, presence and subjectivity, theories of musical autonomy, modernism, mass and popular culture and their inter-relationships, Marxist theories of culture, ideology and hegemony, theories of power, theories of cultural materialism and social semiotics.

Outline Of Syllabus

A series of lectures and seminars will cover a variety of topics, including:
theories of music and colonisation (post-colonial approaches); gender theory and gender politics in musical practice; theories of technology (sound reproduction technologies); theories of authorship (the idea of “authenticity” and other frameworks centred on musical creativity); material theories of culture (the culture industries, culture and class, culture and capitalism); music and identity politics (theorising uses of music in marginalised communities); “autonomist” versus “constructivist” theories of music.

Intended Knowledge Outcomes

The module is designed to help students develop both an awareness of, and the ability to use, recent theoretical innovation in the study of music. In particular, by the end of the module, students should be able to identify and critique a number of key theoretical paradigms from their discipline (musicology) and to be able to apply them thoughtfully and critically to specific musical examples or contexts.

Intended Skill Outcomes

- the ability to think critically and to apply that thinking to a number of different musical contexts
- the ability to engage with challenging texts about music
- the ability to formulate an argument and communicate your views and to contextualise those views in the broader intellectual history of the subject

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

Lectures are the forum in which key concepts are introduced and explained. Seminars allow students to discuss these ideas and start to put them into their own new contexts. Seminars will often be based on close readings of texts which are set for your private study time.

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The portfolio of assignments and the essay assess how well you have assimilated aspects of the course material, (ii) your ability to formulate a critical position on the material, and (iii) your ability to communicate this concisely.

General Notes

n/a